Planning Workouts 101: If you schedule it…

I’m talking, of course, about workouts.

The Stack of Shame. Everything I think I should be taking care of RightThisMinute, but that is still staring back at me months later. (Image courtesy of scottchan / FreeDigitalPhotos.net)

Ah, schedules, to-do lists and, as my business coach likes to say, the “Stack of Shame.” All of the things we know we should do for ourselves that we, ahem, sometimes kind of just forget to do…or shove into the corner for a while while we take this really important phone call…or, you know. We just push them off.

So until I feel better about all of this, I’m going to be scheduling my workouts. Not just saying “If it’s Monday, it must be yoga,” and then hoping I’ll have the energy to go to a class at 4:30 after a long work day. But actually realizing that the only way for me to get a workout done is to actually do it first, before the work day gets in the way. That means – ouch – 6 a.m. for yoga class. Maybe 8:30 if I get up early and get an hour or two of work in first. But, realistically, 6 a.m. for yoga.

When I was training for what became my most successful race season three years ago, I did this exact thing – on swim day, I’d be up at 5 and in the pool by 6, because back then I was working at an office and had to be out of the gym by 7 to get there on time. On speed workout day, same deal – I’d run my mile repeats on the treadmill, often when it was still dark outside. I was a scheduling badass. And, big surprise. Stuff got done.

Want to get stuff done, like, for example, your Every48 workout? Schedule it. Write it down. Make it a must-do. (Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net)

Getting in with a workout group accomplishes the same goal. If I know my track workout is going to be at 6:30 p.m., no questions asked, every Wednesday, then guess what gets blocked out every Wednesday? A plan for getting there and getting in my workout. (Track is my one exception to the “work out in the morning” rule. It’s just way easier to do hard track workouts with a group, and my particular group happens to convene at 6:30 p.m. once a week.)

So, try this on for size for the next few weeks. Take your calendar book, and block out actual time for your workouts. Then, make a point of getting them done. Get used to the following routine:

PLAN –> WRITE IT DOWN –> DO IT.

Once you’ve got that routine down, things will go better. I’m dedicating myself to it this week. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Yesterday’s #Every48 workout: A glorious 7-mile run, first thing in the morning. Yes, I scheduled it! More thoughts on that run – and why I think it went so well – in tomorrow’s post.